(01-30-2015 08:10 AM)BigTribe Wrote:  JMU press is a double-edged sword. We can look unsure and prone to turnovers against press, but our athletic players have also scored many easy layup baskets when they break it with their speed and, lately, spectacular passing. Let's hope we see lots of the latter Saturday afternoon.

Carelessness & indecisiveness are the enemies when a team presses. Being aggressive and attacking the weak spots leads to easy buckets & fouls. Handle a press decisively and make free throws, and a team cannot afford to press. Simple solution, though often easier said than done.

This team "should" be a nightmare to press. You have 4 guys capable of bringing the ball up the court. I also think that the insertion of Tot into the lineup makes us harder to press. His athleticism, height, ball handling, & passing are a ready made press breaker.

Poor defense is responsible for our two conference losses. In both cases, our opponent hung 84 & 85 points on us. We've allowed about an average of 72 in our CAA victories.

We're fully capable of scoring on excess of 80 points and that should be enough.

(01-30-2015 08:37 AM)mrjoolius Wrote:  

(01-30-2015 08:10 AM)BigTribe Wrote:  JMU press is a double-edged sword. We can look unsure and prone to turnovers against press, but our athletic players have also scored many easy layup baskets when they break it with their speed and, lately, spectacular passing. Let's hope we see lots of the latter Saturday afternoon.

Carelessness & indecisiveness are the enemies when a team presses. Being aggressive and attacking the weak spots leads to easy buckets & fouls. Handle a press decisively and make free throws, and a team cannot afford to press. Simple solution, though often easier said than done.

This team "should" be a nightmare to press. You have 4 guys capable of bringing the ball up the court. I also think that the insertion of Tot into the lineup makes us harder to press. His athleticism, height, ball handling, & passing are a ready made press breaker.

This.

I'm not sure why we don't involve more guys in bringing the ball up the court vs. pressure. We have ball handlers that position by position are generally better than most pressers at their individual positions, coupled with more athleticism and length than we have had in the past.

Confidence and focus are the main tools these guys need to employ to aggressively break a press.

You pass to break a zone press. We just need to make sure our guys are playhing strong and not getting trapped or throwing lazy passes.

Nobody is going to press us man to man and if they do, Thornton will break it by himself.

4 big road games to go. It was fun to read the jmu message board reactions to the game. 4 road games in the next 6. Keep it going Tribe. Yesterday was great.

Stunning...great team basketball--play like this and anything is possible.

Good job by the Tribe ... going 2 - 1 on the trip ... getting the big wins at JMU and UNCW.

If they hold serve over the next two home games, here's hoping they open up a two game lead in the conference title race.

Don't think many people predicted 2-1 with the loss at COC, but probably the best case scenario.

Everyone has 6 games left in the season. Here is how things stack up:

W&M - 4 home, 2 away, Away is NU and Hofstra, Home includes Drexel who is at 7-5 tied for 4th. (has tiebreaker over UNCW, 1-0 over Northeastern)

UNCW - 3 home, 3 away, home versus NU and JMU, other 4 games are against under .500 (0-2 vs. W&M, 1-0 vs. NU)

NU - 2 home, 4 away, away vs. Hofstra and UNCW, Home vs W&M and Drexel - (0-1 vs. W&M, 0-1 vs UNCW)

Of the top 3, looks like Northeastern has the toughest schedule remaining and UNCW has the easiest but our having the game in hand and tiebreaker over Northeastern could wind up being beneficial.

In addition,

Hofstra has 4 games left against the top 6 including home versus the Tribe and Northeastern and at Drexel and JMU (3 home, 3 away left)

JMU has 3 games against the top 6 left including @UNCW and home versus Hofstra and Drexel (3 home, 3 away)

Drexel has 4 games left against the top 6 including home versus Hofstra and at JMU, NU and W&M (3 away, 3 home)

Tribe should win enough to earn #1seed. Here is hoping there are no further land mines they step on.

(02-07-2015 11:19 PM)Tribe Fan Wrote:  Tribe should win enough to earn #1seed. Here is hoping there are no further land mines they step on.

Perhaps we should just focus on beating Elon! God I feel old!

(02-07-2015 11:42 PM)WMTRIBE75 Wrote:  

(02-07-2015 11:19 PM)Tribe Fan Wrote:  Tribe should win enough to earn #1seed. Here is hoping there are no further land mines they step on.

Perhaps we should just focus on beating Elon! God I feel old!

If you are talking about the team itself, I agree. There is nothing wrong with fans looking at the big picture and what we think may happen for the season.

(02-07-2015 11:48 PM)tribe_pride Wrote:  

(02-07-2015 11:42 PM)WMTRIBE75 Wrote:  

(02-07-2015 11:19 PM)Tribe Fan Wrote:  Tribe should win enough to earn #1seed. Here is hoping there are no further land mines they step on.

Perhaps we should just focus on beating Elon! God I feel old!

If you are talking about the team itself, I agree. There is nothing wrong with fans looking at the big picture and what we think may happen for the season.

I just think that we (I) as fans spend way too much time playing out a whole group of future games as one, projecting an overall record for the set of games as a whole, rather than looking at them as individual contests that are played 3-4 days apart. We are all apt to just assume wins just because of a team's record or because we have had some recent success against the teams. And accordingly, if things do not turn out as well as we expected, our conclusion can only be that the team underperformed.

I do not know about the rest of you, but the only one of the last six games that I even remotely feel good about is the next game again Elon. We have only beaten Delaware twice since they came into the league. The road games against Northeastern and Hofstra are played at venues where we have struggled mightily. over the years. Towson is the most rugged team in our league. And finally, Drexel is on a five game winning streak.If we manage to successfully navigate this final group of six games and end up at the top of the CAA, I hope that all of us will truly appreciate what we had to accomplish over the final 6 games of the season and not just conclude that all we really did was win a bunch of games that we "should have" all along.

I'm only looking ahead to the next two games ... which happen to be home games ... against teams that beat the Tribe earlier in the season.

Elon and Delaware should have the Tribe's full attention, and the Tribe should be in good shape after these next two home games.

Caveat ... the Delaware curse is real. Because the Delaware game is being played on Valentine's Day, and given the historical origins of Valentine's Day, I believe the curse gets broken this Saturday.

(02-08-2015 08:47 AM)nj alum Wrote:  Caveat ... the Delaware curse is real. Because the Delaware game is being played on Valentine's Day, and given the historical origins of Valentine's Day, I believe the curse gets broken this Saturday.

Not sure what analogy you are trying to make. If St Valentine was martyred for not denying Christ, believing he would be saved, would we then be "martyred/killed" in this game, not denying our belief that this is our year to "dance," with the foresight of seeding possibilities needed to win the CAA tourney in the end (heaven)?

NJ and Nogre...

Please. Some of us are eating.

I am still looking out further but to each their own.

That said, I think getting the one seed will be huge. Not having to face both UNCW and Northeastern could be huge. While anyone in the conference can beat anyone, it seems the conference has been divided into 3 distinct groups 12 games into the season in terms of consistency and dangerousness

Top 3 - W&M, UNCW, Northeastern
Next 3 - Hofstra, JMU, Drexel
Final 4 - Delaware, CoC, Towson, Elon

Our 3 losses have all been on the road to teams in the final 4, Northeastern, has lost 1 to the bottom group, 1 to middle, 2 to top group (2 home, 2 road) and UNCW has lost twice to us and twice to teams from the middle group (2 road, 2 home).

Getting 1 seed would give us the automatic NIT bid if we lose in the tournament but could give us the best chance to only play one of the top teams. Since we have lost to the other teams away from home, we couldn't have let down games but really don't want to play both UNCW and NU in the conference tourney to make the NCAAs.

(02-08-2015 09:25 AM)nogretheogre Wrote:  

(02-08-2015 08:47 AM)nj alum Wrote:  Caveat ... the Delaware curse is real. Because the Delaware game is being played on Valentine's Day, and given the historical origins of Valentine's Day, I believe the curse gets broken this Saturday.

Not sure what analogy you are trying to make. If St Valentine was martyred for not denying Christ, believing he would be saved, would we then be "martyred/killed" in this game, not denying our belief that this is our year to "dance," with the foresight of seeding possibilities needed to win the CAA tourney in the end (heaven)?

St. Valentine performed a miracle back in his day. Asking for another one this Saturday!

:-)

UD is gonna leave Williamsburg looking like this:

(02-08-2015 12:36 PM)zablenoise Wrote:  UD is gonna leave Williamsburg looking like this:

Love it!!!!